Would the sub races of elves really evolve?

Elves have a long life and in most settings, they only have children after a century or two.

Would sub races like, drow and aquatic elves really evolve without any magic intervening?

Considering that humans of the same setting are like us, pretty much everyone is the same.

I think that is really unlikely unless the mutation on the DNA of their children were more radical than on humans.

Edit: I didn't express myself well, I do know they will evolve but I mean will they evolve significantly so that subraces like aquatic elves will exist, since they have +-1/5 of the generation that humans have. And do different but similar species, like elves and humans, could have different mutation rate?

I am building is a fantasy world with magic but with roots in science, I don't like answers like "because it's magic".

The elves in my world do have tetrachromacy and bigger pupil and iris, the fourth receptor allows them to see ultraviolet, all this to make their long-range vision more plausible, and because of this, I defined that they evolved in an environment with preys that hide really well if don't see ultraviolet. And also that magic emit ultraviolet light making them better than other races at perceiving magic around.

Is really hard to choose only one answer, each kind of complements the other.

Edit 2: I found an article online that says that children of older fathers have more mutations in their DNA, I don't how much of this is true but maybe this could justify bigger mutation rates on elves.

posted about 7 years ago

Henrique César Madeira‭

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